This is National Novel Writing Month!

The official site is down at the moment (http://www.nanowrimo.org), but information can be found here too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NaNoWriMo

I'm thinking about doing the 50,000 word challenge.

Is anyone else participating in this?

(I did a search, but you know how well the search works )

11/1/2006 4:15:21 PM

I know a few people who are doing it, and i've wanted to but i never really have the time.

what are you writing about?

11/1/2006 4:25:19 PM

No plan at the moment, ha ha. I have never written before, and I doubt I'll finish this, but it definitely sounds like a fun and enriching activity

11/1/2006 4:29:13 PM

it's pretty cool, i did ~35000 words a few years ago.

they have meetups around the area and you can meet some neat and helpful people while doing this as well.

11/1/2006 4:31:04 PM

I'm making my own pitiful attempt at it again this year. Haven't made it to any of the meet-ups; don't know anyone else doing it. I've made it a personal mini-goal just to exceed the <10,000 words that I wrote last November.

The official site isn't really down. It's very slow because today's the first day of it.

11/1/2006 4:36:44 PM

^ yeah, it kept timing out for me, so I figured I'd pointn out there was somethign wrong so ppl weren't like "OMG YOU POSTED A DEAD LINK"... the internet is serious business, you know.

Good luck in your writings! I might go to a meetup, I don't know yet. We'll see how this first week goes.

11/1/2006 4:39:59 PM

shit, i'm totally going to try this.q

11/1/2006 6:42:09 PM

I already have something I started ... it's about 15000 words

11/1/2006 7:17:21 PM

i can't write fast at all. i'm lucky to get a page done a day. i am easily distracted and it often takes me a long time to figure out how to get a single thought into a sentence.

11/1/2006 7:18:36 PM

I got my first half a page! Yay!!!

11/1/2006 11:22:31 PM

I loathe this more often than not. Having a made-up construction for it like this doesn't help people produce good/better writing. Honestly, "something" isn't always better than nothing.

11/2/2006 12:16:22 AM

don't get your panties in a wad. it's just for fun.

11/2/2006 3:08:35 AM

I wish, i've wanted to but second round of projects and midterms are always in nov, i'm firewalled with work right now till thanksgiving, if not after.

maybe next year.

11/2/2006 6:54:48 AM

^^^ The idea is "quantity over quality." If you don't like it, that's fine. Keep it to yourself. I'm doing this because I feel like it would be an enriching activity; not to submit a manuscript to a publisher or make people read my novel. And the made-up construct gives many of us who can't work without deadlines a chance to get shit done.

It's a personal mountain to climb. It's not about producing "good/better writing."

11/2/2006 10:13:01 AM

So the goal is to write something bad? Just 50,000 words of crap? This isn't what I initially thought it was then.

11/2/2006 10:24:53 AM

"It's not about producing 'good/better writing.'" &ne "goal is to write something bad"

The goal is to write a novel. Some people's will be excellent, some good, and some absolute crap. That doesn't matter, though.

[Edited on November 2, 2006 at 10:31 AM. Reason : not equal]

11/2/2006 10:30:48 AM

It should matter. If someone just writes shit, wouldn't he/she have wasted a month?

11/2/2006 1:25:59 PM

No. Presumably they found it to be a rewarding, fulfilling, and enriching activity. If they DON'T find it to be personally rewarding, fullfilling, or enriching, THEN they would have wasted a month. It's not always about what you produce, it can be about how you feel about producing it.

You clearly have a very different view of what the purpose is in creating something.

11/2/2006 1:32:50 PM

The idea is that, even if their work is awful, this will help people to realize that it can be done. People might do this and then write something that is actually worthwhile.

Of course, I did it a few years ago, it was terrible, I didn't finish, and I hardly ever write anymore. So, uh...yeah.

11/2/2006 1:42:23 PM

Okay, but writing a novel, specifically, seems really limiting as far as your enjoyment of writing is concerned. You could write poetry or random prose without the constructions of characters and be fullfilled that way. Novels as constructions only help convey ideas to a reader. If nobody here was worried about their readers and was just writing these novels for their own personal benefit, then why have a novel-writing month at all? There's an inherent meaning for novels to be read by someone other than yourself. I just mainly wonder if people do this out of having delusions of grandeur instead of for their own personal enjoyment. If so, they're most likely wasting their time by thinking they're going to be the next bestselling author.

Quote :

"Why: The reasons are endless! To actively participate in one of our era's most enchanting art forms! To write without having to obsess over quality. To be able to make obscure references to passages from our novels at parties. To be able to mock real novelists who dawdle on and on, taking far longer than 30 days to produce their work."

That's just fucking catty. If I could write a novel like Thomas Pynchon in my entire life, I'd be happy. Writing novels is indeed an art form, but it's certainly not achieveable for everyone.

11/2/2006 1:51:56 PM

Ok. It's clear that you disagree with this activity. Good for you. How about you start your own thread about it rather than pissing and moaning here?

11/2/2006 1:54:44 PM

OH NOES, DISCUSSION!

11/2/2006 1:59:46 PM

This thread was meant to be a support thread for anyone participating, not a shit-fest about how pointless someone thinks this activity is.

11/2/2006 2:05:19 PM

I disagree. I can't speak to why others are participating, but I'm doing it for my own personal enjoyment. I have no delusions of becoming a bestselling novelist, or publishing; I don't even intend to let anyone else ever read anything I write. It's remotely possible, but unlikely, that I may get around to editing and cleaning up whatever I manage to write this month. Writing a novel is just as legitimate an exercise as writing poetry or random prose.

11/2/2006 2:07:09 PM

^^ I'm sorry, where did it say that in the first post?

Yeah, I have an opinion. Big deal, you shouldn't get so worked up about it. Plus, you have a novel to write and this is taking away from that.

Quote :

"Writing a novel is just as legitimate an exercise as writing poetry or random prose."

I didn't say it wasn't. I just said novels have the inherent need to be read by others based on trying to tell a story- they're therefore sometimes not as personal as other types of writing. I love novels, I just don't think anything but a month of freewriting is going to come of this.

And for whatever reason, having a million people vomit out novels is insulting to authors who spend a great deal more time perfecting their craft. Especially because some of the submissions I saw to this thing last year barely contained complete sentences. Not to mention that a lot of them were juvenille attempts at some version of Harry Potter. I'm not sure how that's supposed to enrich their lives.

[Edited on November 2, 2006 at 2:26 PM. Reason : .]

11/2/2006 2:07:32 PM

^ no it's not. Writing is an activity for my evening times.

^^ Agree 100%. Thank you.

[Edited on November 2, 2006 at 2:09 PM. Reason : pmc]

11/2/2006 2:08:55 PM

i fail to see how it's an insult to real novelists. anyone with brain cells can tell professional and amateur work apart.

11/2/2006 2:59:27 PM

my brother did this last year and actually wrote just over the 50,000 words. i was amazed. i think he plans to spend this month editing it now.

i'm not creative enough to write fiction, or else i'd try.

11/2/2006 3:00:23 PM

Quote :

"I just said novels have the inherent need to be read by others based on trying to tell a story- they're therefore sometimes not as personal as other types of writing. "

I don't even know what that means. The only kind of writing that is written with the express goal of being read by as many people as possible are billboards and catalog copy. And maybe a Dan Brown book. Are you really trying to say that "On The Road" or "100 Years of Solitude" or "Satanic Verses" aren't personal or emotive?

I'm doing this too, just because I don't write anymore and I'd like to crap something out just to see if it gives me momentum to keep doing little stuff, and to gauge how much drinking has ruined my output

11/2/2006 4:28:23 PM

My New Year's Resolution was to complete a book (it's not really a novel, though). I guess this is as good a month as any to finish it up. I have one chapter left, plus a lot of editing.

[Edited on November 2, 2006 at 4:36 PM. Reason : .]

11/2/2006 4:35:28 PM

Quote :

"I don't even know what that means. The only kind of writing that is written with the express goal of being read by as many people as possible are billboards and catalog copy. And maybe a Dan Brown book. Are you really trying to say that "On The Road" or "100 Years of Solitude" or "Satanic Verses" aren't personal or emotive?"

They all are, and very much so. But they're also widely-read novels. None of those authors kept it and said "this is mine, I'm only going to write this for myself and never let anyone else see it." I'm glad they didn't. I just mean that writing a novel usually isn't writing just for yourself.

[Edited on November 2, 2006 at 6:49 PM. Reason : .]

11/2/2006 6:47:58 PM